Structuring 21st century government for homeland defense

A report by Kennedy School of Government lecturer Elaine C. Kamarck, “Applying 21st Century Government to the Challenge of Homeland Security,” offers some specific recommendations: -- Create a National Terrorism Intelligence Center within the FBI to fuse intelligence gathering capabilities of national security agencies with investigative resources of law enforcement -- Increase protection at the borders with the establishment of a Border Patrol Agency -- Provide market incentives for the development of vaccines or drug treatments that could be utilized in response to bio-terror attacks -- Establish guidelines that allow for the use of “racial profiling” by law enforcement to isolate potential terrorist suspects; -- Develop protocols allowing law enforcement access to data contained in the vast databases of the private sector to protect the nation from terrorists -- Grant consular officials access to international crime and terrorist databases -- Deputize state and local officials so they can arrest illegal aliens -- Grant FEMA additional resources and allow it to act as the lead agency for preparing and coordinating federal, state, and local government response to terrorist events -- Require all medium-to-large size American cities to develop an “all hazard” approach to emergencies The work was supported by a grant from The PricewaterhouseCoopers Endowment for the Business of Government.